Derek Westbrook
Derek Westbrook is a former MMA fighter, a current TACITUS agent, and a main character in the TACITUS saga. He is one of TACITUS' more recent recruits. Biography Early life and start of his drifter years Not much is known about Derek's early life, except for the fact that he was born in the year 2000 and that he went to a prestigious high school, where he graduated late in 2015 at the age of 16 with a solid GPA (his rather high IQ and the fact that he took challenging classes allowed him to skip a grade). After graduating high school, his rebellious behavior really took off. He abruptly left home after hearing that his mother took custody of two of his sisters after a vicious custody battle following the divorce. This was when his time as a rebel really began. Age of Lawlessness In the summer of 2015, Derek began what he called his "Wandering Age", sometimes known as his "Years of Lawlessness", where he became a voluntary drifter and hardcore rebel, traversing the country with no place to call his own and working odd jobs here and there whenever he could. He also voluntarily got himself involved in investigating and redressing other people's grievances, in addition to living a rather immoral lifestyle. Derek would be visiting strip clubs, spending time at bars, hanging out with the wrong crowd, getting into fights, hooking up with multiple girls and young women, etc. These activites led to him being wanted for various different crimes he has committed during his escapades. At one point during his period of lawlessness, Derek got particularly wasted on alcohol and in a drunken stupor, he accidentally got one of his then-significant others pregnant. Derek sobered up eventually, but felt so much guilt from the incident that he later broke up with the girl, but not before suggesting to his equally-guilt ridden partner that she should give the child up for adoption. Unbeknownst to him, Derek's ex-girlfriend actually kept the child and soon raised a healthy daughter going by the name of Heather Hodges. Later during his Wandering Age, Derek was considered a "bounty hunter" of sorts, hunting down criminals and bringing them down on behalf of others. It was during this time period that Derek developed a notorious vigilante reputation that earned him a host of new friends and enemies. He eventually formed a vigilante gang known as The Renegades. Military career In January of 2016, Derek voluntarily ended his wandering years by enlisting in the United States army Rangers. He served tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as Africa. During one particular mission in East Africa, Derek met a mysterious assassin known as Sevin Sezen, who eventually became Derek's first love interest; Derek and Sevin eventually became good friends, and later, the two fell in love. However, their romance didn't last as long as any of them would have liked: during a tour in Sudan, Derek's unit was ambushed by Islamic insurgents in late April of 2016. 30,000 personnel (most of which were his own men) were dead or wounded in the ensuing massacre. Derek and a handful of his men survived, due to an unexpected intervention by Sevin Sezen, who stepped in and saved Derek and his men, but was seriously injured in the ensuing shootout with Islamic militants. Sezen was rushed to a nearby hospital, but not before asking Derek to avenge her. Later that same day, Derek was told that Sevin had died of her injuries. Feeling survivor's guilt because of the incident, Derek considered leaving the force, but stayed after his colleagues Alvin Torres and Jordan Williams talked him out of it. As a TACITUS agent In the spring of 2016, Derek had been transferred into TACITUS, along with Alvin and Jordan, and became one of their best counterterrorism agents, partaking in numerous counterterrorism ops across the globe. Later that same year, Derek participated in Operation Pickpocket, an operation to recover a stolen briefcase from terrorists that planned to use it as a bioweapon. In May of 2016, Derek also participated in Operation Queen Bee, another TACITUS operation to find and rescue American hostage Amber Young. Later that same year, after successfully dismantling a human trafficking ring, TACITUS director Hugh Collins gave him some time off to give him a chance to relax. During this time, he was abruptly reconnected to his long lost sibling, Corinne Westbrook, and decided to reunite with her. Later in his life, he came into contact with a campus ministry organization named Campus Crusade, which invited him to a Christian retreat called Fall Getaway. Becoming a Christian During his time at Fall Getaway, Derek was exposed to the Christian faith for the first time since his youth (having rejected the Christian faith numerous times on other occasions on the basis of Christians appearing to be too "demanding"). After a while, Derek became convicted of the truth of the Gospel and the implications of life without it. Consequently, Derek and a few of his friends who went to Fall Getaway with him, converted to Christianity. Later adventures At one point in his life, Derek Westbrook, together with his friend Vince Crosby, pursues a violently misanthropic spree killer known as the Black Falcon, who goes on a rampage across New York City to kill as many people as he can, with the intention of avenging the people the Black Falcon has killed (some of whom were his close friends). With help from allies they forge throughout the mission, Vince and Derek track down the Black Falcon to a cottage in the countryside outside Buffalo, New York, where they successfully thwart the deranged monster's attempted murder of a young woman by beating and strangling him to death. Derek also participated in the February 2018 Religious Riots; in response to a Oneness Pentacostal Street Preacher spreading Christianity at the St. Louis University of Missouri and the surrounding vicinity, Ellie Cohen, Kalinin himself, Emmett Mack, Vince Crosby, Derek himself, and various other people gathered up a crowd of people and attempted to run him out of the campus. The situation suddenly escalated into a full-blown riot, and eventually a fistfight, when the street preacher persisted in his preaching, and it got so bad that police had to get involved. Thankfully, nobody was severely injured. Personal details Physical appearance Derek is depicted with brown (sometimes blonde) hair and green-blue eyes, with a rather young face. Derek is a large man, standing at 6'5" (1.96 m) tall, weighing about 250 pounds and having a 50-inch chest, much like former military policeman turned drifter Jack Reacher. His six-pack looks like a cobbled street and his muscular chest appears to look like a suit of NFL armor, with large, bulging biceps, a thick neck and hands that resemble dinner plates in size. He blames his muscular appearance on working out at the gym consistently both before, during and after his military career, and he claims that years of working out and sleeping at a particular time consistently led to a rather unique growth spurt. In his youth, he appeared to look like a bulked-up greyhound. As for his muscles, Derek attributes that to years of working out, being athletic through high school and his early years at college. In his youth, Derek is said to resemble either the actor Chris Evans or actor Zachary Gordon. As he entered his twenties, he is said to resemble Australian swimmer James Magnussen. Personality In his adolescent years, Derek showed himself to be smarter than most kids his age. He blames this on the fact that he had been blessed with an "unusually high IQ". He is sometimes more intelligent than his parents. He is also portrayed as a rather moral person. During his Wandering Years/Age of Lawlessness, Derek was a die-hard, rebellious man who wanted to live in the thrill of the moment. He was pretty much a self-centered individual who wanted only fun and enjoyment in life, although after he got a girl pregnant in his teens, he began to rethink his rebellious lifestyle and decided to set moral boundaries for himself. He decided that anything was fair gain, as long as it was not illegal (i.e: it would not get Derek arrested). He also had a sort of "paranoia" about death after hearing about the future judgment God will place on human souls after people physically die. In addition, he had a primal sense of justice and didn't feel any remorse when fighting vigilante wars against criminals. After converting to Christianity, Derek gradually becomes a humble, selfless man that puts the interests of others above himself. Driven by his desire to be as "Christ-like as humanly possible", Derek develops a charitable heart, always looking to the interests of others rather than focusing solely on his own needs. This makes Derek well liked among his peers, and even his enemies acknowledge his good heart, despite their own evil aims to destroy him. Skills and abilities Being a street fighter throughout his high school, Derek is quite proficient in hand-to-hand combat. He attributes this to his military career, as well as his street-fighting training he'd received thanks to his time in street gangs during his youth. While fighting, Derek generally goes with the flow of the fight, focusing on finishing it as soon as possible. His modus operandi involves observing the opponent and using that to his advantage by planning his first move and hitting hard and as qucikly as possible, before the opponent can strike first. His main goal is to ensure that the unfortunate opponent that dared to provoke him never makes such a mistake ever again. In fights, he favors headbutts, elbow strikes, and kicks to the groin. His signature martial art is Keysi Fighting Method. Derek also has acute deduction skills, mainly while talking to people or making minute observations about his surroundings. This is one of the major reasons why criminal investigators sometimes turn to him to help solve crimes and why his enemies fear him-Derek knows how to stay one step ahead of the criminal(s) he is pursuing. Derek describes himself as a "late sleeper", having the ability to stay awake for long hours and still somehow get enough sleep to fuel a healthy human body. Derek also considers himself a very "unorthodox" dancer, as seen in Revival: Operation Holy Spirit. He is seen making erratic jerking motions with his arms and legs during a dance party on the last official day of Fall Getaway and calling them "dance moves." Habits and religious beliefs Derek does not have any favorite music genres, as he prefers to listen to pretty much anything except country; he thinks country music is "boring" and too "dry" for his liking and prefers the more "aggressive" types of music like heavy metal, pop, techno-pop, death metal, thrash metal, etc. Westbrook was never raised in a church, and prominent members of his family, especially his grandparents and adopted sister Gina Westbrook are atheists. Derek himself was an agnostic prior to becoming a Christian, having had bad experiences with street preachers in the past that left him with a mistrusting view of God and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. However, once he came into contact with CRU and went to Fall Getaway with them, he grew to understand (and later accept) the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Once he became a Christian, Derek soon found himself feeling conflicted about showing the love of Jesus to others and ending a potentially healthy relationship because of the recent revelation that he has become a Christian. This tension often leads him to chicken out of sharing his faith with others. As he grew older and more spiritually mature, however, Derek became a bold person who was never ashamed of his beliefs and would share his faith with others as soon as a chance opened up. Derek has had multiple indulgences: in his youth, it was hitting up with girls and drinking coffee. Now, it's reading the Bible and blowing things up. Weaponry and equipment TBA Trivia *He is the youngest of the Westbrook children, even though he looks deceptively older. *Losing Sevin Sezen proved to be one of the key events that haunted Derek for most of his life: he still feels survivor's guilt after having bad memories of watching Sevin die in front of him from time to time. *Derek is 6'5", the tallest character in the TACITUS series. Due to this, he is sometimes nicknamed "the Tall One" by friends. *He, like many other people in the series, looks deceptively older than he really is (In Revival: Operation Holy Spirit, he is 16, even though he looks like a thirtysome-year old man). *He was originally supposed to join Delta Force alongside Gerald Moore, but this was changed to the Army Rangers. *Derek's tall stature is physically based on (and partially inspired by) ex-military policeman turned drifter Jack Reacher, who is also 6'5", in the novel series by Lee Child. *Derek has stated that in middle school, high school and college freshman years, he has taken MMA (mixed martial arts class), something he is proud of. His MMA fighting has carried over to his TACITUS career. *He claims to be from a family of "Army men". *Derek is the tallest of the Westbrook children (He is 6'5", his sister Corrinne is 6'2", his other sister Kristen is 6'1.5" and his oldest (also foster) sister Gina is 5'5" (the shortest of the Westbrook children). *His signature martial art is the Keysi Fighting Method, alongside Corrine Westbrook *He wears contacts due to his eyesight failing while in his forties. Consequently, his eyes appear brown, not blue like they really are. *Westbrook became the first person to find out about Operation Blackfish, the notorious CIA project responsible for brainwashing ordinary citizens into becoming merciless killing machines, that Svetlana Karpova and Tamara Sultanovich were part of before finding out about the CIA's crimes and defecting. Gallery New life.png|Derek Westbrook's new life Derek in his forties.png|Derek on vacation in South America Dual-wielded madness.jpg|Derek on a gun rampage Derek Westbrook on a rampage.jpg|Derek at war Derek Westbrook, age 17.jpg|Derek Westbrook, aged 18 James Magnussen.jpg|Derek in his twenties Quotes Personal quotes "I lived my whole life believing the right thing, for all the wrong reasons." - Derek Westbrook Dialog with others "I say we tag team this guy." "Yeah, I agree." - Derek Westbrook to Vince Crosby as they face off against unknown foreign operatives "He looks like member of Russian mafia!" "Well, he doesn't fight like one. He fights like a government agent!" "Wait a second, how do you know?" (Awkward moment between Derek Westbrook and Theresa F. Derossett) "I used to be one." (Derek grins) "Oh. I guess that explains a lot..." "LOOK OUT!" (He gets bull rushed by the foreign asset) - Nikolai Kalinin, Theresa Derossett, Derek Westbrook, T. Derossett, Vince Crosby and Nikolai Kalinin during a fight against a foreign operative "You said you were a government agent?" "Yeah. But I can't say where." (Derek takes a deep breath and nods in understanding) "Right. Confidentiality. I get it." - Derek Westbrook and Theresa Derossett "I say we tag team this guy." "Yeah, I agree." - Geena Westbrook and Derek Westbrook Category:Former military Category:Tall characters Category:Christian characters Category:Delta Force soldiers Category:Siblings Category:Allies Category:Reformed characters Category:Characters in the TACITUS series Category:Columbus High School students